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What can I do if my child is taken abroad?

On Behalf of | Jan 20, 2021 | Uncategorized

Many New Yorkers are single parents who are raising their children in a separate household from the other parent. Most of the time, both parents must follow the orders of New York family courts when it comes to custody and parenting time.

While one hopes that child custody and parenting time arrangements in these cases go smoothly, many parents are not able to get along for a number of reasons.

In extreme cases, one parent may try to keep the children from the other parent, even by moving to or returning home to a country outside the United States.

When a parent engages in this behavior in defiance of a court order, the other parent may feel he or she has limited options. After all, the courts in another country do not have to acknowledge the authority of New York’s court orders.

Fortunately, a piece of international law called The Hague Abduction Convention offers some protection to parents who have been denied access to their children because the other parent moved abroad without authorization.

Likewise, this law also allows parents to get the right to see their children even if the children are living in a foreign country. This is true even when the children’s move abroad is lawful.

International custody and parenting time questions are complicated

Filing for relief under The Hague Abduction Convention can be a very complicated process. As with any international custody issue, seeking assistance from an experienced family law attorney is usually a good idea.

Basically, many countries around the world, including the United States, have agreed to follow a process to make sure that parents who have the rights to custody or visitation with their children get to exercise those rights.

Except in certain limited cases, foreign courts are supposed to assist parents in White Plains and Westchester County with having their parenting time or custody enforced, and they are also supposed to cooperate with having children returned to the United States.